Tag: jane devlin

Today I watched a video. It’s was horrifying and upsetting and it broke my heart.

It was posted by fellow blogger and acquaintance Jane Devlin. Her original post can be found here.

Jane is someone I connected with via Twitter and she is someone that I have a great deal of respect and admiration for. Her life has had its ups, downs and topsy-turveys. She has also written a book, which if you follow me on twitter you would have seen a while back that I recommended it. Her book is called Elephant Girl: A Human Story. It took me 2 days to read and when I was finished I had even more respect and admiration for Jane. Her strength and determination is amazing. I would highly recommend you read her book.

I watched the video 1 and a half times. The first time, I got about 45 seconds in and I couldn’t watch anymore. I re-read Jane’s post and her last sentence really struck a chord with me.

“Do not turn away from this. Thousands of children suffer this kind of abuse and worse every single day. If they can bear the pain and trauma, then you — and here I am speaking to the ones who are so quick to criticize survivors and write them off as perpetual victims, chronic whiners, or people who just need to “get over it” — should at least have the backbone to watch four minutes of what an abused child suffers for years.”

I went back and I watched the whole video, horrified at what I saw. I know that child abuse happens, every day to thousands of children, and I often wonder what I can do to prevent it. I’d love to adopt and love and nurture and support every child who is abused. Unfortunatley I can’t do that, but I CAN raise awareness. It is NOT OK. it will NEVER BE OK.